If you say the name “Adolf Hitler” among other things that comes to mind is a political madman who gassed millions of Jews in his infamous “Final Solution.” But the release of his medical records now up for bid online suggest his life was marked by another kind of gas: major flatulence. And he was also a coke head, to boot:
It’s a whole other side to the Nazi dictator, whose condition was revealed in medical documents now up for grabs online from Alexander Historical Auctions of Stamford, Conn. Bidding for the papers, which include X-ray copies of Hitler’s skull and sketches of the inside of his nose, ends Tuesday and Wednesday.
The U.S. military commissioned the medical reports provided by Hitler’s personal doctors, said Bill Panagopulos, president of Alexander Autographs.
Among the more surprising notes, he said, was that the “Mein Kampf” madman used powdered cocaine extensively to soothe his sinuses and throat, and was also prone to passing gas.
Hitler was treated with pills containing strychnine, a poison, “which probably explains his stomach pains,” Panagopulos told the Daily News.
Hitler also used chamomile plants as a “cleansing enema,” the reports said.
The sinister dictator — who also inspired one of the funniest film comedy songs ever written that later became ba huge hit on Broadway on a smash original cast album — has been the subject of several news stories in recent months.
The headstone of Hitler’s parents is going to be removed from its Austrian grave to prevent neo-Nazis from using the place as a pilgrimage site.
And a secret World War II report prepared by British intelligence has surfaced which suggests that as Hitler started going down to defeat his hatred of the Jews intensified as he more and more perceived himself as a Messiah:
A secret intelligence report that has lain unread since World War Two tells how Hitler showed signs of a ‘messiah complex’ and grew more and more paranoid as defeat loomed.
The document was drawn up for British secret services in April 1942, just a few months before the Nazis embarked on the Final Solution, and identifies how the leader increasingly turned to ‘Jew-phobia’.
Written just as the conflict was starting to turn against Hitler, it shows British analysts had noticed developing paranoia in his speechmaking and a preoccupation with what he called ‘the Jewish poison’.
Just weeks after the analysis was compiled, senior Nazis set in place plans for the Final Solution – an intensification of the mass extermination of Jews.
Experts say the papers show British secret services sensed that, as the war turned against him, Hitler would resort to increasingly drastic measures.
As the war dragged on and Hitler realized he might not succeed, his speaking abilities waned:
The document was found among a collection of papers belonging to the family of Mark Abrams, a social scientist who worked with the BBC’s overseas propaganda analysis unit and the psychological warfare board during the war.
Written by Joseph MacCurdy, a Cambridge academic, it refers to earlier signs of ‘morbid tendencies’, classifying these as ‘Shamanism’, ‘epilepsy’ and ‘paranoia’.
The first referred to Hitler’s hysteria and compulsion to feed off the energy of Nuremberg Rally-style audiences.
By 1942, MacCurdy said, this characteristic was in decline, and his report refers to the ‘dull flatness of the delivery’.
And, realizing his time at the top might not be as long as he anticipated, he apparently sped up his plans for the Jews:
The other two tendencies were, however, developing. ‘Epilepsy’ referred to Hitler’s cold and ruthless streak, but also a tendency to lose heart when his ambitions failed.
MacCurdy thought the outcome of Operation Barbarossa, which had stalled the previous winter, had exposed this fatalism, and he wrote that Hitler’s speech betrayed ‘a man who is seriously contemplating the possibility of utter defeat’.
Most alarming, he said, was Hitler’s growing paranoia. By this, MacCurdy meant the Nazi leader’s ‘Messiah complex’, in which he believed he was leading a chosen people on a crusade against an evil incarnate in the Jews.
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FOOTNOTE: Due to partisans in American politics now throwing around the words “like Hitler” or “like the Nazis,” I decided to restudy the era. I STRONGLY recommend to anyone interested in reading William Shirer’s 1300 page “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” — 1300 hundred pages that literally race along. I’ll review it later on TMV, but it was the first book I’ve read where — drawing on his speeches, captured documents and notes from top Nazis — I could “hear” Hitler speaking. I felt badly when the book ended because it was so engrossing. If you haven’t read this award winning book, you (young and old) need to. Check out the reviews on Amazon yourself by clicking on the icon below:
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.